This episode features “In This Moment, We Are Happy” written by Chen Qiufan. Published in the August 2019 issue of Clarkesworld Magazine and read by Kate Baker. Originally published in Chinese in Dandu Reading 19, January 2019.

The text version of this story can be found at:
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/chen_08_19

BACKGROUND AUDIO
One heartbeat overlaps onto another; the first slow and steady, the second initially faster than the first by two thirds before slowing down. With a nervous energy, the two rhythms intertwine, their timbres cooling and turning mechanical, weaving into a grander, more complex electronic soundscape.
CAPTION
In spring 2015, the new Visual Anthropology program at [...]

This episode features “A Man Out of Fashion” written by Chen Qiufan. Originally published in Chinese in Science Fiction World, October 2014. Published in the August 2017 issue of Clarkesworld Magazine and read by Kate Baker. This translation is based on a version of the Chinese text that has been substantially revised by the author.

The text version of this story can be found at:
http://clarkesworldmagazine.com/chen_08_17
Support us on Patreon at http://patreon.com/clarkesworld

Waking from an endless dream, Du Ruofei found himself naked in bed.
For a long while he simply lay still. The dream had lasted so long that he had forgotten where he was supposed to be. Finally, he recognized the dilapidated apartment he had been renting for the last three years: unfashionable décor dating from the [...]

I judge of your sight by my sight, of your ear by my ear, of your reason by my reason, of your resentment by my resentment, of your love by my love. I neither have, nor can have, any other way of judging about them.
—Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments
Balin’s dark skin, an adaptation [...]

0.
My mother told me about a Buddhist monk she and I met while shopping on my first birthday.
The monk caressed my head—back then as bald as his—and chanted a few lines that sounded like poetry.
After we returned home, my mom recited a few fragments to my father. Dad, who had had a few more [...]

Two fists are before my eyes, bright sunlight reflecting from the backs of the hands.
"Left or right?"
I see myself reaching out with a child’s finger, hesitating, and pointing to the one on the left. The fist flips, opens. Empty.
The fists disappear and reappear.
"One more chance. Left or right?"
I point to the one [...]